Despite struggles Pistons still in a playoff race

By
Dave Pemberton, The Oakland Press

Monday, March 10, 2014

AUBURN HILLS >> Despite all the Pistons struggles as of late, they are still in a playoff race. Heading into Monday night, Detroit (24-39) trails the Atlanta Hawks (26-35) by just three games for the final playoff spot in the Eastern Conference.

Entering Monday, the Hawks were 1-14 in their last 15, yet the Pistons haven’t been able to gain much ground in the standings. Detroit has lost three straight and is just 3-10 since firing coach Mo Cheeks.

Pistons interim coach John Loyer admitted he talks to the team about the playoff race, but the players already know what they are playing for.

“I address it when I think it’s appropriate,” Loyer said. “It gets addressed enough. The guys know what’s at stake. It’s not like anybody in front of us is running away from us and there’s a couple teams behind us trying to make a push to pass us by. There’s four or five teams in the same boat we’re in.

“You win a game and you feel like you got a great chance. You go out and lose a game and you’re down in the dumps, and wonder when you’re going to win the next one. You just gotta get a win and build on them. We haven’t been able to, once we got a win then go get the next one. That’s something we need to do.”

A huge problem for the Pistons has been defense. Detroit has given up 107.8 games in the 13 games since Loyer took over. Thus far in March the Pistons given up an average of 108 points and are 1-4 in that span.

“Defense has to be something you start in training camp and build throughout, but our defense has regressed to the point that you kind of do some things starting over,” Loyer said after Monday’s practice. “We watched tape today on 12 to 15 possessions that isn’t what we practiced. And we watched tape of 12 to 15 possessions of things that we just got done practicing that were pretty good.

“Sometimes when the going gets a little tough you resort back to things that maybe aren’t second nature to you. It’s our job as coaches to make them second nature. It’s something we practice every day. You just have to build upon the good things.”

Effort has also been a problem at times for the Pistons. Loyer didn’t feel the team put forth its best effort in a loss to the Celtics Sunday and admitted those types of losses are even harder to swallow.

“You take every loss pretty hard,” Loyer said. “You take every loss even harder when you maybe you didn’t feel like you gave your best effort. And I didn’t think as a team over 48 minutes we gave our best effort (in Boston). We gave it in spurts. We’re selective in our multiple efforts. That’s a reflection on the coach. That’s something, I gotta do a better job of getting it out of them because you gotta play for 48 minutes in this league no matter who you’re guarding or playing against. They happened to make quite a few shots that maybe that hadn’t made all year, but you got to adjust your game to however your opponent is playing.”

Loyer considers effort a skill and wants his team to give multiple efforts on defense, help when a guy gets beat on the dribble and get out on shooters if there is a kick out.

“You can,” Loyer said when asked if you can coach effort. “You hope you don’t have to on a daily basis, but it’s part of the job. I’ve always said your energy and your effort needs to be a constant, but it’s a skill. You describe some NBA guys, he plays hard. Their is some hard playing guys, that’s the reason why they’re in the league. You gotta develop guys into harder playing guys and that’s what we need to do.”

Detroit will look to get back on track when it hosts Sacramento Tuesday before playing at Toronto Wednesday.